Grab something to hang on to as Paramount Home Entertainment had a wild, wild week of film fan new release announcements, including two new “Paramount Presents” films arriving on Blu-ray on Aug. 10 and 14 new Blu-ray selections from the Miramax library, which was acquired by the studio in April of last year.
So, let’s get to it with the news about auteur filmmaker Robert Altman’s 1975 Best Picture nominee, Nashville, which is getting a new 4K film restoration and will be joining the studio’s popular “Paramount Presents” line of Blu-ray products on Aug. 10.
What an undertaking, 24 major characters crossing paths during a week in “Music City,” which, of course is Nashville, Tennessee. Altman teamed up once again with screenwriter Joan Tewkesbury, who had worked with him on Thieves Like Us, and she came up with a script that pleased him. He added to it with even more characters (she started with 17 or 18, depending on how you count them) and then took it to United Artists, where he had done his last two pictures, Thieves Like Us and The Long Goodbye.
They didn’t understand it, too complicated. Pass. More studios passed on it. Too many moving parts; too many characters; too many storylines to keep track of. You name an excuse, studios executives found it.
Enter Jerry Weintraub, a producer of television music “events” at the time, mainly with John Denver (twice nominated for Emmy Awards, winning for the broadcast of An Evening with John Denver), who arranged financing. Paramount would handle the distribution.
With Altman’s vast episodic television background (long before he became a legendary film director, he cut his teeth on episodic television series during the 1950s and 60s), coupled with his cadre of regular actors, he was able to fill out the cast list, which included Keith Carradine from Thieves Like Us, Shelley Duvall, who had her film debut in Altman’s Brewster McCloud and followed it up with the role of Ida Coyle in McCabe & Mrs. Miller and then teamed with Carradine in Thieves Like Us (Nashville would be her fourth feature film, all under the direction of Robert Altman) and Jeff Goldblum, who had just finished Altman’s California Split.
He also recruited Laugh-In regulars Henry Gibson (who also worked with Altman on The Long Goodbye) and Lily Tomlin (her film debut … which earned her only Oscar nomination, Best Supporting Actress), the incredible Karen Black (who apparently sent her songs to Altman … he said come on and sing, she did), plus Geraldine Chaplin (who, it is rumored, was willing to work for nothing just to be in Altman’s film), Scott Glenn, Barbara Harris, Ronee Blakley (who was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress, which put her head-to-head with Lily Tomlin) … and on and on.
Actors in the movie wrote their own songs, improvised dialog and Altman used sound and camera tricks that brought together his complicated story … and somehow it all works. For his efforts, he was nominated for Best Director!
As to bonus features, there is a vintage commentary option featuring Robert Altman and the newly prepared featurette titled “24 Tracks: Robert Altman’s Nashville.”
Also joining the “Paramount Presents” line of Blu-ray releases on Aug. 10 is director George Stevens’ 1951 film adaptation of Theodore Dreiser’s 1925 true-crime novel “An American Tragedy,” which was re-titled for its theatrical release as A Place in Sun.
For his efforts, George Stevens would win the Oscar for Best Director and the film would be nominated for Best Picture as well, but this almost didn’t happen. It seems that the studio had previously adapted the novel way back in 1931 with Josef Von Sternberg directing and Phillips Holmes, Sylvia Sidney and Frances Dee in the key roles. That was 1931, it bombed at the box office, the author who alive at the time disowned it and the studio had a long memory … eventually Stevens prevailed, especially with a cast featuring Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor and Shelley Winters.
This turned out to be a labor of love for George Stevens as he spent nearly a full year in post-production working on the film. The results were near perfection, but the great irony was that the film ended competing head-to-head with A Streetcar Named Desire … and with An American in Paris also in the running for Best Picture, the vote-splitting between the two heavyweight dramas likely cost A Place in the Sun the Best Picture honors.
The same could be said for Montgomery Clift and Marlon Brando, who faced off in the Best Actor category and that gave Humphrey Bogart the edge he needed to win for The African Queen. A very tough year indeed.
As to bonus goodies, we have a vintage commentary track with George Stevens, Jr. and Ivan Moffat (Oscar nominated for his script for George Stevens’ Giant), archival cast and crew interviews, the featurette titled “George Stevens: Filmmakers Who Knew Him” and the newly prepared featurette titled “Filmmaker Focus: Leonard Maltin on A Place in the Sun.”
And, as mentioned, Paramount Home Entertainment will releasing 14 Miramax films on Blu-ray this coming July 27 … these are: 40 Days and 40 Nights, Albino Alligator, Chocolat, Cider House Rules, City of God, Cold Mountain, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Equilibrium, Grifters, Madonna: Truth or Dare, Marvin's Room, Mimic: Director's Cut, Reindeer Games: The Director's Cut and Strictly Ballroom.
No comments:
Post a Comment